Wellbeing Wednesday – Forest School

Today in our Wellbeing Wednesday sessions the focus was solely on mental health as part of Children’s Mental Health Week 2024. After discussing what mental health was and ways we already look after our mental health, pupils were free to choose from a range of activities designed to make them feel good and at ease. First of all, pupils had the opportunity to do sit spotting where they find a tree to sit under and switch off from the world. With eyes closed, children used their listening skills to tune into nature and were fascinated by all the birds they could hear singing in the trees. This led us onto trying to identify some of them and an in-depth chat about our school grounds and how wildlife rich they are. On the back of that, children chose to do a litter pick and to tie up hammocks. Both activities allowed pupils to solely focus on one task and, in the case of litter picking, feel a sense of satisfaction at doing a job well and from helping the wildlife we’d noticed earlier. Whilst in the hammocks, children enjoyed cloud gazing and having the opportunity to relax. The final activity pupils could enjoy was making pancakes on the fire pit. Children followed a recipe, lit and maintained the fire before helping Mr Gamble cook the pancakes. There was a varied choice of toppings but who needs that when you can put a lot of every single one on your pancake like most of the children did! 

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